Did strategic voting propel Alberta's Redford to re-election?

David Wise is a businessman residing in Annapolis, Maryland. A frequent commentator on public policy, he holds an MALD from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. Now an independent, he was three times elected a delegate to the Democratic National Convention, beginning in 1972 at age 19.

The campaign is over. The votes have been counted. And the winner is …Nathan Cullen.

What? Yes, of course, Alberta Premier Alison Redford is the official winner scoring a stunning upset victory to keep the Progressive Conservatives’ streak of victories in the province unbroken since 1971. Instead of losing the election Ms. Redford has won the premiership in her own right with a solid majority of 61 out of 87 seats. Her victory is one in which she never wavered from her core principles and never panicked in the face of daunting poll numbers – all of which were proven wrong.

Yet, it appears that so-called “strategic voters” who are ostensibly Liberals or members of the NDP who crossed over and voted for the Progressive Conservatives with a view to making their votes count in deciding what type of government would be formed to rule Alberta were decisive. One Liberal voter quoted Monday evening said it all when noting that Alison Redford was as close to electing a Liberal premier that Alberta was going to get.

This is not exactly the way in which Mr. Cullen has advocated the point, but the lesson and practical effect is the same. Members of the parties on the left cannot continue to dissipate their energy only to see the election of governments antithetical to their beliefs.

Right up until election day voters were urged to vote for the party of their heart not to change their votes with an eye to the outcome. Although there are self-serving reasons why party leaders would make these statements, the whole point of elections is to make decisions that will affect real outcomes: who will lead and which policies will they pursue.

This is especially true under the particular conditions that prevail in Canada where there are multiple parties competing in a first past the post system of selecting winners. In Ottawa, as everyone knows, there is a majority government with just 39.6 per cent of the vote while the Liberals and the NDP, with 49.5 per cent of the vote in the last election between them, sit across the chamber speaking to themselves.

If Canada had proportional voting, as some advocate, or if it had run-off elections, as is the case in many multiparty states, then voting your heart in the first round makes sense. Under the Canadian system, it can be a ticket to the wilderness and seeing a government at odds with core values and beliefs. In the waning days of the recent campaign many moderate voters and voters on the left decided that they were not willing to let that happen.

Although on its face the election resulted in the status quo, the outcome of this election will have profound ramifications across Canada. The rejection by the voters of the Wildrose surge shows that — even in Alberta — Canadians are not quite as conservative as many in the PMO would like to believe. The distant fourth place finish by the provincial NDP, the first election since the federal NDP’s leadership election, throws a bit of cold water on Thomas Mulcair’s “go it alone” path to 24 Sussex, while providing some validation of his new House Leader’s more pragmatic electoral strategy.

But, it was the Liberals who were the biggest losers on Monday. Having polled 29.4 per cent in the previous election, the Grits polled only 9.9 per cent and garnered five seats (compared with ThreeHundredEight.com’s election eve projection of ten seats).

Of possibly greater significance to the Liberals, however, is what might have happened had the moderate Progressive Conservatives experienced what moderate Republicans have experienced over the past two decades in the United States: rejection. Two years ago fellow Albertan, Jim Prentice, discovered that he was not comfortable in the Harper cabinet. If on Monday Alison Redford and her more moderate and urban followers had found that they were no longer welcome in the conservative ranks then one can speculate whether Red Tories such as Mr. Prentice and Ms. Redford might have considered finding a new home and providing much needed new blood to a somewhat realigned centrist Liberal party.

Now we will never know. Monday was also bad for the Liberals as the Redford victory appeared in the newspapers next to Michael Iganateiff’s prediction that independence for Quebec would come “eventually.” This was bad for the Liberal party and bad for Canada. Ms. Redford’s stated desire to use Albertan prosperity not only to build the province but to build bridges to support the nation is a more hopeful message and reality.